Hattie Big Sky

From the Book jacket:
2007 Newberry Honor Book
For most of her life, sixteen-year-old Hattie Brooks has been shuttled from one distant relative to another. Tired of being Hattie Here-and-There, she summons the courage to leave Iowa and move all by herself to Vida, Montana, to prove up on her late uncle's homestead claim. "At least now my letters will be more interesting," she writes to her good friend, Charlie, who is fighting the Kaiser in France.
Under the big sky, Hattie braves hard weather, hard times, a cantankerous cow, and her own hopeless hand at the cookstove. Her quest to make a home is championed by new neighbors Perilee Mueller, her German husband, and their children. For the first time in her life, Hattie feels part of a family, finding the strength to stand up against Traft Martin's schemes to buy her out and against increasing pressure to be a "loyal" American at a time when anything-or anyone-German is suspect. Despite daily trials, Hattie continues to work her uncle's claim until an unforeseen tragedy causes her to search her soul for the real meaning of home.
Lovingly stitched together from Kirby Larson's own family history and the sights, sounds, and scents of homesteading life, this young pioneer's story celebrates the true spirit of independence.
A JUNIOR LIBRARY GUILD SELECTION
12 & up
Thanks to her eighth-grade teacher, Kirby Larson maintained a healthy lack of interest in history until she heard a snippet of a story about her great-grandmother's homesteading by herself in eastern Montana. Efforts to learn more about Hattie Wright's homesteading felt like detective work; why hadn't anyone told Kirby research could be this much fun? Her three years' work on Hattie Big Sky involved several trips to Montana, one by train, as well as countless hours in wonderfully dusty courthouse records rooms and newspaper morgues. Kirby Larson lives with her husband, Neil, in Kenmore, Washington, where they are both active in the community. Their son works in the film industry in New York; their daughter is an interior designer. When she's not reading or writing, Kirby is teaching, gardening, traveling, or drinking lattes with friends.